² tn Heb “the firstborn.”

¹ tn Heb “the firstborn.”

¹ tn Heb “the firstborn.”

¹ tn Heb “and the firstborn said.”

³ tn Heb “with Abiram, his firstborn, he founded it.”

² tn Heb “the firstborn.” This refers to the oldest male child.

² tn Or “as substitutes” for all the firstborn of the Israelites.

⁴ tn Heb “and every firstborn of man among your sons.” The addition of “man” is clearly meant to distinguish firstborn humans from animals.

¹ tn Grk “every male that opens the womb” (an idiom for the firstborn male).

¹ sn The firstborn son typically had special status and received special privileges.

² tn Heb “every opener of a womb,” that is, the firstborn from every womb.

¹ tn Heb “the firstborn according to his birthright and the youngest according to his youth.”

² tn The “firstborn of death” is the strongest child of death (Gen 49:3), or the deadliest death (like the “firstborn of the poor, the poorest”). The phrase means the most terrible death (A. B. Davidson, Job, 134).

² tn Heb “and not to be listed in the genealogical records as (having) the right of the firstborn.”

² tn Heb “to Makir, the firstborn of Manasseh, the father of Gilead, for he was a man of war.”

¹ tn Heb “and the lot belonged to the tribe of Manasseh, for he was the firstborn of Joseph.”

² sn In the Exodus event of the Passover night the principle of substitution was presented. The firstborn child was redeemed by the blood of the lamb and so belonged to God, but then God chose the Levites to serve in the place of the firstborn. The ritual of consecrating the firstborn son to the Lord was nevertheless carried out, even with Jesus, the firstborn son of Mary (Luke 2:22-23).

¹ tc The Hebrew text has, “the firstborn of the poor will graze.” “Firstborn” may be used here in an idiomatic sense to indicate the very poorest of the poor. See BDB 114 s.v. בְּכוֹר. The translation above assumes an emendation of בְּכוֹרֵי (b^ekhore, “firstborn of”) to בְּכָרַי (bekharay, “in my pastures”).

² tn Two prepositional phrases are used to qualify the kind of sacrifice that Abel brought: “from the firstborn” and “from the fattest of them.” These also could be interpreted as a hendiadys: “from the fattest of the firstborn of the flock.” Another option is to understand the second prepositional phrase as referring to the fat portions of the sacrificial sheep. In this case one may translate, “some of the firstborn of his flock, even some of their fat portions” (cf. NEB, NIV, NRSV).

¹ sn The expression pass through your midst alludes to Exod 12:12, where the Lord announced he would “pass through” Egypt and bring death to the Egyptian firstborn.